Griffith Observatory
The Griffith Observatory was an Earth observatory building which operated during the 20th century. It was located in the Hollywood Hills of Los Angeles, California. A monument was located in front of the main building which honored six Earth astronomers, namely Hipparchus, Galileo Galilei, Nicolaus Copernicus, Johannes Kepler, Isaac Newton and William Herschel. In 1996, it hosted a SETI lab funded by Henry Starling, employing several astronomers including Rain Robinson. Rain Robinson and Henry Starling met once at the Griffith restoration party. That year, the Griffith Observatory featured a museum with exhibits about Saturn, Mars, Halley's Comet and a planetarium show, which was hosted by Rain Robinson on Tuesday nights. Robinson was working at the Observatory for the project when she discovered an unidentified flying object in orbit over Los Angeles. Defying orders from Starling, Robinson transmitted a SETI greeting from the Observatory to the object, which was actually a time-displaced . The crew of Voyager then used the greeting to track Robinson at the Observatory. Robinson's laboratory was located in room 123. It was decorated with numerous B-movie posters and collectibles. It also featured a map of the Sol system and various computers, some made by Chronowerx Industries. When Robinson surprised Tom Paris and Tuvok, who were sent to find out what she knew about the in orbit, in her lab, Paris excused themselves by telling her, they had been on the museum tour and "took a wrong turn at the Saturn exhibit". To get back from Rain's lab to the lobby, one had to "go right down the hall, take a left at Mars, right at Halley's Comet and then just keep going straight ahead past the soda machine". After she realized that Tuvok and Paris had wiped the hard drive of her computer, she followed them outside to the front of the building, where they had parked their car. There, they were attacked by H. Dunbar, Starling's assistant, who vaporized their Dodge Ram with a 29th century phaser while hiding behind the statue commemorating the astronomers. Paris, Tuvok and Robinson were able to flee in her van when Dunbar lost his weapon for a moment. ( ) The following day, they returned to the Observatory and used the radio dish again to send a message to the Voyager, like Robinson had done the day before. They modified the satellite dish transmitter und thus were able to carry and receive Voyager communication frequencies and contact Janeway. ( ) was held at this observatory. ( )|The observatory was opened in 1935. Its most famous cinematic appearance is the 1955 film Rebel Without a Cause, which was photographed by Ernest Haller, features Corey Allen, Ian Wolfe and Chuck Hicks in the cast, and a music score by Leonard Rosenman.|After nearly five years of restoration and expansion, the Observatory reopened on November 3, 2006 with several new attractions, including The Leonard Nimoy Event Horizon, a new 200-seat multi-media theater, named in honor of Leonard Nimoy who, together with his wife Susan Bay-Nimoy, had principally funded the construction of the theater. The newly opened Griffith Observatory also features a planetarium show co-written by long-time Star Trek science consultant André Bormanis.}} External links * - official web site * * de:Griffith-Observatorium fr:Observatoire Griffith Category:Earth structures Category:Filming locations